HYDERABAD, Jan 7: A large number of working journalists of Hyderabad held a protest meeting at the local press club on Monday against the registration of a false criminal case against the editor of daily Kawish, Ali Kazi, and executive editor Ayub Kazi.

The meeting was of the opinion that the case was registered against the editor and the executive editor at the instance of the DIG, Hyderabad Range, Rauf Yousuf Zai, and district police officer Moazzam Jah to pressure the newspapers not to highlight the grievances of the masses.

Speaking at the meeting, Ali Hassan, Lala Rehman Samoon, Ansar Naqvi, Aziz Malik, Abdul Hafeez Abid, Rasheed Rajar, Naz Sehto, Akhtar Baloch, Sohail Sangi, Iqbal Mallah, Madad Ali Sindhi and others criticized the police high-ups for registering a false FIR against Ali Kazi and Ayub Kazi.

They said if the editor and the executive editor were not safe, no journalist in Sindh should consider himself safe.

The meeting decided to launch a protest movement against this incident, in particular, and the excesses against journalists in Sindh, in general.

It demanded an apology from the authorities and the cancellation of the FIR.

It further decided to hold a meeting of the leaders of public opinion and people from different schools of thought on Jan 10, outside the Hyderabad Press Club and take out a rally on Tuesday.

According to the protest programme, the journalists will stage a token hunger strike at the district headquarters of Sindh on Jan 9.

Meanwhile, the police in a written statement said that the FIR in question was lodged on the complaint of a private person, namely Khamiso Khan Hajjano, and that no police officer was involved in it.

Reproducing the contents of the FIR in the statement, the police described the reaction of journalists to the registration of the FIR as uncalled-for since it was a case of a citizen against some people.